Delicious
by itsvolcanoday
Summary: "Miss Berry, I'm Detective Noah Puckerman. I'm investigating the abduction of Mrs. Tina Chang." "I was wondering when you would get to me. I work at the Midnight Lounge, so obviously I have to be involved, right?" - A film noir-inspired AU.


A film noir and hard boiled detective inspired AU one shot for Puckleberry Week over on tumblr. Now, to be fair, it's been a while since I've read Hammond or Chandler, so I'm mostly going by the feminist film noir books and film noir films I've worked with recently, which puts a different spin on it. I'm not an expert on this era by any means, so I apologize for any inaccuracies or drastic stylistic deviations!

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Even in the late afternoon, the stairs leading down to the lounge were dim and dingy. He could hear the noise of the shop overtop, at street level, still open and bustling with the sound of busy shoppers and housewives and the people he tried to avoid. It was early enough that one bouncer stood at the door, broad shouldered and with a face hard like leather.

"Sorry, mister. The club opens at six."

He glanced up at him, eyes hard but amused. "I'm not here for the club. I'm here to meet someone. I was told she'd be here."

"And who might that be?"

"Miss Rachel Berry," he recited, memorized from the piece of paper he had jotted it down on from his conversation with Chang.

He liked that name. Rachel Berry. There was a ring to it, something that felt good on his lips. It tasted like strawberries and honey, and he wondered if the girl it belonged to was as delicious as her name.

A protective light gleamed in the bouncer's eyes. He bet she was.

"And who exactly are you?"

"Detective Noah Puckerman. I need to ask her a few questions about a kidnapping."

He flashed his badge. He loved flashing his badge. He'd worked hard to get that badge, police academy after high school, years on the force before being promoted to detective, but now he had the bright, shining badge to prove it. He loved yanking it out of his coat pocket, showing it to bouncers and guards and secretaries, watching their eyes widen before he shoved them aside to do whatever he needed to do.

Sure enough, the bouncer's eyes widened, and he moved aside, making room for the detective to walk through.

The Midnight Lounge was infamous around the police station. At night it seemed like a fairly reputable lounge scene. He'd been there a few times, with some of the guys from the station, before he went back to his empty, bachelor's apartment or headed a few doors down to see if he could chat up some of the girls in the Third. But it didn't take him long before he saw the layers underneath the reputation. There was a reason that it was mostly a men's club, and that had to do with Sonny King.

Sonny King was the owner of the Midnight Lounge, and he had long been in the pocket of Len Summers, who owned one of the biggest crime rings in this town with a specialty in prostitution. Sure, he had some run down dames headlining at some of the strip clubs around the city, but Len did a little more than that – he put his whores right under the policemen's noses, right in the middle of the Midnight Lounge. Waitresses, dancers, singers. All you had to do was talk to the bartender, and he would find the girl you wanted to spend some time with.

But Sonny King wasn't stupid, and Puck and his buddies on the force had never gotten enough evidence on him to shut the place down. And it wasn't so bad, he guessed – these were the high class hookers, the ones Len and Sonny took care of to keep the customers coming back and paying higher prices. Sonny knew Puck was onto him, so he kept his books clean. And Puck knew he kept his books clean, so he never went after him.

But when little Mrs. Chang went missing, and it turned out her former roommate worked at the Midnight Lounge, Puck thought he may just have something.

The bartender was already there, a tall blonde fellow, cleaning out tumblers to be later filled with whiskey for middle aged men looking for something outside their marriage vows. He looked up when Puck walked over, half a grin on his face. "If Bruno let you in, I'm guessing you're some kind of official. What are you looking for?"

Puck smiled. He couldn't help it. Kid was infectious. "I'm looking for Rachel Berry. You know her?"

The guy nodded knowingly, and Puck wasn't sure what he knew.

"Over by the stage," he said, gesturing with the hand clutching the towel.

She was a small girl – petite, they liked to be called. Short, slim, but curved everywhere a woman should be. She wasn't looking at him, she didn't even know he was there, so he leaned against the bar and stared a little longer, looked at the curly brown hair tumbling down her back and the lean legs propped up as she sat on the stage, talking emphatically with one hand to a short dark-haired guy, gesturing at some papers in front of her, while the other dangled a lit cigarette.

The bartender was saying something, but Puck didn't care, pushed off the bar and walked over to her, straight line across the floor. He'd found Miss Racbel Berry, and she was just as delicious as he thought she would be.

The man she was talking to caught sight of him, mumbled something else, and left. She was all alone, perched on the stage, taking a drag from her cigarette, when he reached her.

"I hope I'm not interrupting something."

"You were, but you aren't now," she said coyly. Her voice was smoother than most girls', prettier somehow. Delicious, just like the rest of her.

"You're Rachel Berry, aren't you?"

"Sure."

"I'm Noah Puckerman, detective for the police department. I'm investigating the abduction of Mrs. Tina Chang."

"I was wondering when you would get to me. I work at the Midnight Lounge, so obviously I have to be involved, right?"

The smoke from her cigarette wafted to the ceiling in curls.

"Look, Miss Berry, I know what goes on here. And it's not the kind of stuff I'd want my sister involved in. It's the kind of stuff where, if you get too involved in it, you disappear."

She visibly stiffened. He wasn't sure why.

"Well, I assure you, Detective – Puckerman, was it? – that Tina was certainly not involved. She has no idea that I work here. The only reason her husband knows is because the fool came in here after work a few weeks ago." She took another long drag on her cigarette, her plump red lips wrapping around it like candy.

"Is there any other way she could have found out? Her husband could have told her. She could have come here wanting to get you out of this hole, and someone found out about it that shouldn't have."

"I assure you, Detective Puckerman, that, as much as you may know about what's going on here, you don't know what's going on with me."

She put her cigarette out and rose from the stage, and he finally noticed the dress clinging to her form like wrapping paper, her feet stuffed into too tall heels that had his mouth watering. She sauntered over to the piano, papers in hand, where the man she was talking to earlier was studying the keys.

"Miss Berry, this conversation isn't –" he started, but she waved him off over her shoulder.

He didn't know what to do with this dame. He was good with women, always good with women, good at making them happy and making them talk and making them come home with him on a rough night. He could tell what they needed and what they wanted, and he'd give it to them. Simple as that. All the boys in the police station wondered how he got those skills, but he didn't have anything to tell them. It was innate. And that was why this broad was rubbing him the wrong way.

He'd just started to move towards the piano to follow her when the dark-haired kid's fingers ran over the keys, and Miss Rachel Berry started to sing.

She was good. She was real good. Better than he could have imagined someone being. That pretty, smooth voice of hers was made for hitting high notes and low notes and everything in between. Puck didn't know much about music or about singing, but he knew this girl was talented. Without even thinking about, he leaned back against the stage where she had been sitting before, and maybe his mouth fell open a little bit.

When she was finished, the bartender and the girls, filling in before the club opened, burst into applause, but he still couldn't quite find anything to say. She had completely stumped him the way no other girl had before.

She stalked back over to his position on the stage, leaning in close enough for him to smell her perfume.

"Detective Puckerman," she began, her voice soft like honey, "I know what goes on in the Midnight Lounge. I know because I grew up in this business, and I know because I have connections to the man behind it all, and we both know who that is. And I know you think I'm a whore."

He started to say something, but she continued before he could speak.

"But, you see, Detective Puckerman, you can't be a very good detective, because I'm the only girl in this club that isn't. I'm a lounge singer, detective, and if you had noticed that I was looking through sheet music, if you had paid attention to Blaine going straight over to the piano from talking to me, if you had realized how strange it is for a girl like me to be dressed like this and already here practicing this early in the afternoon, you might have realized that and saved yourself a lot of trouble."

He could still smell her perfume, but her eyes were drawn to her lips, painted deep red and pouting as she spoke. Red was her color, he decided, on her dress and her lips and her nails. Red because he could already tell playing with this girl was like playing with fire. He started to speak again.

"No, detective, don't worry," she finished for him, her face moving closer to his so he couldn't help thinking of what it might be like to feel those sweet pouting lips against his skin, "I'm not offended. I understand why you came to the conclusion that you did. It was logical. I'm only a little –"

Now she cut herself off, pulling back from him before finishing softly, "—disappointed."

He caught himself leaning in after her, and stopped before he could embarrass himself anymore. This wasn't the kind of thing that happened to Noah Puckerman. He was a good detective, observant, and he usually caught things like that, and even if she was right that he should have put the pieces together he didn't appreciate her insulting his competence. And he didn't really care for the way she was acting, like she held something over on him. No dame held something over Noah Puckerman – not if he didn't want them to, and he wasn't that decided on her yet.

"Miss Berry –"

"Don't worry, detective," she said, scooping up her sheet music. "Tina's disappearance had nothing to do with the Midnight Lounge. I haven't spoken to her in months, and I doubt I can be any help at all, and even if I had I hope you would believe that I take care of my friends. You see, my godfather can't deny me anything."

The wheels clicked in his head. He had heard from one of his informants that there was a girl out there, rising on the scene, but he never would have suspected her. "You're Len Summers' –"

She brought a finger to her lips, shushing him smoothly behind a smile. God, she had great lips.

"Now, Detective Puckerman, I assume that you can tell by now that I am not lying when I say that Tina's disappearance had nothing to do with me, and I will assume that you'll start looking somewhere else. I won't be of any help to you in your search, I'm afraid. Now, if you don't mind, there are a few songs I need to rehearse before I perform tonight."

She dropped her sheet music on the piano, pulled a lighter and cigarette case from her purse, and lit a cigarette swiftly. She turned away from him, dismissing him, and he nearly laughed at the audacity of her character. Nearly because he was too busy watching the curves of her back as he put on his hat and prepared to leave.

He'd only gotten a few steps towards the door when that pretty voice of hers called out again.

"Oh, and Detective?"

He turned around, a smile spreading over his lips. He didn't know what this girl was, but he was pretty sure he loved it. "Yeah, sweetheart?" he answered ruefully.

"If you need me for anything, you know where to find me."

She couldn't have been more flirtatious if she had winked at him. Yeah, he thought maybe he liked this dame.

As he walked out, grinning, some of the whores filtering into the room looked at him admirably, delicately licked their lips, fingered their stockings. Normally Puck would have noticed, tilted his hat in acknowledgement, and shot them a sly smile that said, "Thanks, but maybe later."

But Puck today barely noticed, because he couldn't see past the mystery that was Miss Rachel Berry.

And he never could resist a mystery.


End file.
